


The Three Men I Admire Most

by half_sleeping



Category: Kuroko no Basuke | Kuroko's Basketball
Genre: Gen
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2013-09-28
Updated: 2013-09-28
Packaged: 2017-12-27 20:50:55
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,036
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/983454
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/half_sleeping/pseuds/half_sleeping
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Nijimura and Kuroko cross paths over wristbands.</p>
            </blockquote>





	The Three Men I Admire Most

**Author's Note:**

  * For [z04](https://archiveofourown.org/users/z04/gifts).



> Title taken from the original American Pie lyrics.

While Kagami-kun hunted fruitlessly through the third store on the second block, Kuroko suppressed reprehensible feelings of schadenfreude, politely refrained from pointing out that if they did not find a pair of shoes for Kagami-kun soon they would miss the second most important match of the year, and determinedly steered himself away from the vanilla-flavoured protein bulk-up powders towards the relatively safer (for his digestion system) waters of the wristband section. A flickering bulb illuminated this section of the store, which seduced allowance-flush teenagers with multi-coloured dusty racks. 

Kuroko cynically perused a tag which claimed that the wristband it was attached to would improve energy levels, increase engagement in the game, provide vital joint support and possibly even reduce teenage acne. The one next to it also claimed to have all these benefits with the addition of an Adidas logo and slightly fluffier fabric, and for the privilege of bestowing this range of features upon some lucky owner charged an additional five hundred yen. This list of accomplishments was amazing for what Kuroko was intellectually well aware was a glorified hand towel.

Intellectually.

He reached for one of the black ones. He had some fifteen hundred of those, but what was another. Aspiration to the greatest wristband collection in Teikou had been a great way to pass the time while Aomine-kun spent five hours staring at a brand new limited edition pair he wasn't able to afford. Kuroko’s own upper limit for mindless drooling fruitless avarice was two hours, but for a brand new hardcover edition novel signed by one of his favourite authors in the second hand bookshop, he could go to three.

 His hand collided with the hand of another patron.  

“Oh,” said Nijimura-san. For a moment Kuroko expected to see him in Teikou's jersey, levering that familiar impatient stare at his derelict junior, but Nijimura-san was dressed in street clothes, and the jacket he wore was neither blue nor white but dark with a fringe of fur around the hood. “Kuroko. Didn’t see you there.”

They both considered the phrasing of what he’d said, and the awful familiarity of it. Nijimura-san was taller than he had been, but so was Kuroko, and Kuroko had less far up to look than he once had.

Above, a series of thumps and a very manly scream conveyed to Kuroko a sense of Kagami-kun’s battle with Japanese sizing. The dust of decades fell from the ceiling, shaken free by five minutes of basketball player.

“Yes,” said Kuroko finally. “Nijimura-san, hello.”

Nijimura-san looked at Kuroko’s jersey, and this late in the season, on this day of all days, there was only one place Kuroko could have been heading. Kuroko did not know if, after his graduation, Nijimura-san had continued monitoring the progress of the Generation of Miracles, or even where he studied now, if he still played. To Kuroko Tetsuya, worst of the third-string players, the lack of awareness of the movement of Nijimura Shuzou, the (once) best middle school power forward, came as a sudden and rather bittersweet shock.

“Congratulations,” Nijimura-san said, with the same authority, that note of mingled warmth and approbation and challenge, _do you have the time to be concerned about anyone else_ , and Kuroko was thirteen again, and responding to the certainty in Nijimura-san’s voice with a straightened back and a renewed resolution. “Hell of a time to be looking for shoes.”

Kuroko displayed his box. “I have mine,” he said, as Nijimura-san gazed at the familiar box for Ascics (Gelhoop duo 3s), Teikou-regulation match shoes, in blue and white and edged off with black. Nijimura-san blinked at it, but didn't comment on the model.

Instead, he said, “You’ve been doing well,” with a burr of self-deprecation for the doubt he’d once expressed, still felt. “I saw the match with Touou.”

 _With Aomine_ , Nijimura-san did not say, with that boy who begged me for your place on that team we were once a part of.

 "Who d'you got today?" 

"Kise-kun," said Kuroko, though this was not strictly true. Kaijou's Kise, Kuroko would have rephrased himself. 

The corner of NIjimura-san's mouth quirked up, but he did not dispute this. "Those two are going at it, I heard,” he said.

"Shuutoku and Rakuzan," said Kuroko. Midorima-kun and Akashi-kun.

Akashi-kun.

Nijimura-san was thinking the same thing. Kuroko had once spent seven weeks studying every nuance of their former captain’s expressions, trying to decipher what it was about Nijimura-san and his basketball that had led Teikou, that had stepped aside and not regretted a moment and as Nijimura-san’s brow furrowed and the (left) corner of his mouth twisted down, Kuroko recognized the complications of speaking of the Generation of Miracles, the pull between prodigy and personal affection. “Good luck,” he said, and somehow Kuroko knew that Nijimura-san was not talking just about the match that would result from today.

Kuroko looked down at his shoes.

He would not have been in this position in Teikou, his mind supplied for no particular reason. Momoi-san would never have let them go for so long without replacing their shoes. She had kept a close track of their equipment, always making sure they would be match-ready, that Murasakibara-kun hadn’t suddenly grown out of his uniform again, or that- ah. Idea.

“Kagami-kun,” Kuroko called up the stairs. “Please come down from there, we have four more shops to try.” Perhaps Momoi-san would know of a place which carried Kagami-kun’s size in- what was he saying to himself. Of course she would know, and if Kuroko’s request was an imposition, then, this was an emergency.

In the meantime, they might as well try more shops. Kuroko bowed his head to Nijimura-san in farewell. Kagami-kun levered himself down the stairs and they left, Kuroko regretfully leaving the wristband behind.

(Nijimura watched him go. He had already arranged to go to watch Akashi play, for the final of the Winter Cup, not because he thought the outcome of the match would surprise him but because he had known it would not. Now he was less sure, though not for any reason he could have adequately defined for the edification of another.

Perhaps it would be worth watching, just to see how Kuroko’s basketball had changed. )


End file.
